Category Archives: abortion

Under Arizona’s H.B. 2036, the state would recognize the start of the unborn child’s life to be the first day of its mother’s last menstrual period. The legislation is being proposed so that lawmakers can outlaw abortions on fetuses past the age of 20-weeks, but the verbiage its authors use to construct a time cycle for the baby would mean that the start of the child’s life could very well occur up to two weeks before the mother and father even ponder procreating.

On page eight of the proposed amendment to H.B. 2036, lawmakers lay out the “gestational age” of the child to be“calculated from the first day of the last menstrual period of the pregnant woman,” and from there, outlaws abortion “if the probable gestational age of [the] unborn child has been determined to be at least twenty weeks.”

This is what people are putting their energy into these days. Not the economy, not health care for living children, not security and not education. Just repeated, incessant attempts to legislate women’s uteri.

I wonder if the next step is to call the normal times when fertilized eggs are simply washed out a homicide.

When people like me talk about the dangers of the religious right, this is what I mean. The worst you can say about “militant atheists” is that they act like douchebags and put up obnoxious billboards.

And once again (because it bears repeating) this is violence enacted with political aims intended to cause fear: terrorism.

Even if the woman opts to “close [her] eyes,” as Corbett suggests, the doctor will have to turn the ultrasound image toward her face, give her two signed copies of the printed image, describe the number of heartbeats per minute and tell her if that’s normal or not for a fetus of that age. She then has to wait 24 hours and bring all the signed paperwork and both ultrasound images to her abortion doctor in order to have the procedure legally, and the doctor has to repeat to her the age of the fetus.

This just makes me want to vomit.

You know what? Let’s extend this idea. Before we decide to bomb a city in, say, Iran, we have to get a manifest of the local population, photographs of everyone, watch a video interview with all of them, read a list of their favorite foods and movies, and before the bomb itself can be dropped, the president has to get on television and list every citizen who’s about to die, along with their ages, genders, and hobbies.

The latest bill — which is scheduled to be discussed by a legislative committee for a second time on Wednesday — contains a number of provisions which would give the state one of the most sweeping anti-abortion laws in the nation. Among the provisions is one which would exempt doctors from malpractice suits if they withhold information — in order to prevent an abortion — that could have prevented a health problem for the mother or child. A wrongful death suit could be filed in the event of the death of the mother.

Well that’s good at least. If the mother dies, then then you can file a suit. Jim dandy. Fuck.

I don’t know if his objections were religious or not; all I know is that when a bleeding woman was brought to him for treatment he refused to do the only thing that could stop the bleeding. Because he didn’t do abortions. Ever.

My two kids at home almost lost their mother because someone decided that my life was worth less than that of a fetus that was going to die anyway. My husband had told them exactly what my regular doctor said, and the ER doctor had already warned us what would have to happen. Yet none of this mattered when confronted by the idea that no one needs an abortion.

Okay, so my headline wasn’t fair, but my point was that this is what happens when “religious freedom” is allowed to be an excuse for these situations.

At that same CPAC, they suggested referring to birth control as “abortion” to try and get public support to turn against it. I wish I was kidding.

“This is religious freedom. If they can tell the Catholic Church that they have to provide contraception to their employees, then they can also tell National Right to Life that we have to provide abortions for our employees.”

“This new situation that’s coming down [from the Obama administration] is actually an abortion mandate. As an organization we’re going to be more disciplined about talking about the abortion mandate coming from HHS and I would encourage you all to do the same.”

You want to know why I consider most right-wingers to be off their nut? Because birth control can send them into a frenzy like this. Birth control. But then, these are religious leaders like Tony Perkins who want to legislate from the Bible, so no surprises.

Now, if I had to take a guess about what’s happening here, I’d say the answer is that the right is so goddamned against Planned Parenthood that it really doesn’t matter what they do. PP makes abortionplexes, so everything they’re a part of is unfavorable. Although I’m pretty amused at the “not sure” chunk. I like to imagine people agonizing over whether they like the idea of cancer prevention despite political bias.

Honestly it’d be like me saying I hate that a Christian group helps the homeless because I don’t like that they do other things. Simply asinine.